An Air Force helicopter carrying six American soldiers crashed in Afghanistan yesterday, killing all on board, U.S. Central Command said.
Although the cause of the crash was still under investigation, Central Command said in a statement that the loss of the copter “was not the result of enemy action.”
The helicopter was conducting a “medical evacuation mission,” the statement said.
The HH-60G Pave Hawk helicopter crashed 18 miles north of Ghazni, Afghanistan, shortly after 11 a.m. Eastern time.
The names of the dead were being withheld pending notification of their families. Close to 20 such helicopters have gone down since 1988, rarely in combat. The death toll has risen to more than 140 soldiers.
In recent incidents:
* Four American and eight British soldiers were killed when a U.S. helicopter suffered mechanical failure on Friday along the Iraq-Kuwait border. The CH-46E Sea Knight chopper was apparently felled by dust storms.
* Four crew members were killed on Feb. 25, when their MH-60 helicopter went down during a night training mission about 30 miles north of Kuwait City.
* Four soldiers were killed in January when a Black Hawk helicopter crashed during training near Bagram Air Base outside Kabul.
* Eleven soldiers died when their Black Hawk crashed into a remote part of Fort Drum in upstate New York after a routine assault exercise.